Noun

1 (law) an estate secured to a prospective wife
as a marriage settlement in lieu of a dower [syn: legal
jointure]

2 the act of making or becoming a single unit;
"the union of opposing factions"; "he looked forward to the
unification of his family for the holidays" [syn: union, unification, uniting, conjugation] [ant: disunion]

English

Noun

References

Jointure is, in law, a provision for a wife after
the death of her husband. As defined by Sir Edward Coke,
it is "a competent livelihood of freehold for the wife, of lands or
tenements, to take effect presently in possession or profit after
the death of her husband for the life of the wife at least, if she
herself be not the cause o determination or forfeiture of it': (Co.
Litt. 36b).

A jointure is of two kinds, legal and equitable.
A legal jointure was first authorized by the Statute of
Uses. Before this statute a husband had no legal seisin in such lands as were
vested in another to his "use", but merely an equitable estate.
Consequently it was usual to make settlements on marriage, the most
general form being the settlement by deed of an estate to the use
of the husband and wife for their lives in joint tenancy (or
"jointure") so that the whole would go to the survivor. Although,
strictly speaking, a jointure is a joint estate limited to both
husband and wife, in common acceptation the word extends also to a
sole estate limited to the wife only.

The requisites of a legal jointure are:

the jointure must take effect immediately after the husband's
death;

it must be for the wife's life or for a greater estate, or be
determinable by her own act;

it must be made before marriage; if after, it is voidable at
the wife's election, on the death of the husband;

it must be expressed to be in satisfaction of dower and not of part of
it.

In equity, any provision made for a wife before
marriage and accepted by her (not being an infant) in lieu of dower
was a bar to such. If the provision was made after marriage, the
wife was not barred by such provision, though expressly stated to
be in lieu of dower; she was put to her election between jointure
and dower.

After marriage, a wife could bar her right to
dower by a fine being levied. This meant that
in practice, jointures could also be created by a post-nuptial
settlement, provided the wife was willing. Wives (or their
relatives on their behalf) often paid her husband a lump sum (known
as a portion) or otherwise handed over her property to him, in
exchange for a jointure (usually being more than a third) being
settled on her for life. This might (in practice) be in the form of
a share of the whole property or the right to a particular part of
it or an annuity from it.